We’ve had some reorganization within the Community Management Team, the next Rat Chat is imminent, and we’re giving you a sneak peek at the ReadMe for the upcoming 1.35.12 patch! Take a look at all the details in this week’s Dev Update!

Community Management Team Staffing Changes

We’d like to announce some changes that have recently been made in the Community Management team. Due to some circumstances beyond his control, KMS has stepped down as the Community Management Team Lead. He will still be a part of the Community Management Team and will assist the team as an ACM! The community could not ask for a better advocate than KMS and we ask everyone to take a moment to thank him for his continued service to our awesome community! We’re lucky to have him as a part of our team!

Stepping up to take the reins of the new Community Management Team is BLKHWK8! He’s got some big shoes to fill, so next time you see him in game, give him your congratulations! BLKHWK8 has already brought some great ideas and a fresh perspective to the team and we’re excited to see all the great work that he’ll do for our awesome community!

We also would like to introduce to you 2 new Assistant Community Managers who have joined the team, BIRDMAN26 and SPEAR!

At CRS we know how important community is to our game (remember that pretty much every single member of the development team started out as just a player!) and we’re excited that we have Community Managers who are absolutely dedicated to being the primary liaisons between the community and the dev team! They’d love to hear from you so when you see them around, make sure to chat with them for a little while!

Rat Chat Tomorrow 3/9/18!

It’s time once again to sit down and chat with the Rats! We’d like to invite you to join us for a informal chat and Q&A between the Rats and the community!

We will kick things off at 2pm Server time (US Central time)

The Rat Chat will be held as a Zoom Webinar! This format was a big hit the last time and we’re hoping that you will join us for another great discussion about all things WWII Online!

First Look at the 1.35.12 ReadMe

We’re getting close to our next content release for WWII Online and we wanted to give you all a sneak peak at the ReadMe that goes along with it! As we have not finalized the release yet, all of this may not be final and we reserve the right to make changes if we need to.

============================================
World War II Online
Version 1.35.12.0 – Update: (March 2018)
============================================
This Production Update adds even more NEW content to the game in the way of Fighter-Bombers, Close Support tanks, and even a few Italian infantry.
============================================
Client related:
============================================
New Content
– For Fighter-Bombers we see the introduction of the Hurricane Mk IIb “Hurribomber” for both the British and French air forces. It will carry two 250lb GP Bombs and ten .303 Machine Guns. The German air force will get the Bf 109E-4/B (Jabo) which will carry a single SC250 250kg Bomb and its standard armament of two 7.9mm Machine Guns and two 20mm Cannons.
– Close Support (CS) Tanks will include the Crusader II CS and Matilda II CS for the British ground forces. CS tank armament will include High Explosive (HE) and Smoke rounds along with their standard machine guns. The German forces, while not specifically CS tanks, will receive Smoke rounds for both the PzIVD and StuG III B tanks.
– The British ground forces will be receiving an upgrade to the Vickers light tank series which will be the Vickers Mk VIC. It has an upgraded primary weapon, the 15mm BESA heavy Machine Gun.
– The Italians will be joining the German ground forces. They will constitute of the Carcano Rifleman and the Beretta Submachine Gunner, which will have standard infantry loadouts made up of other German gear.
– The 250 Hispana Squad Decal has been added for recognition of their support in the 2017 fundraiser
– New Builder, Volunteer, and Rat Decals have been added
New Commands
– Joining another player’s mission will now be much easier than it used to be. With the addition of the .join <player name> (or .j) command, players that are not spawned into the game will be able to quickly join another mission without the need to navigate through the Graphical User Interface.
============================================
Bug fixes:
============================================
– Locked the bailout, build PPO, confirm box, despawn, and quit windows so that they are not able to be moved on the screen
– The HC Manual, in game, has been updated with missing commands
– Alt+Tab was broken a few patches ago and should now work better than it was
– Chinese Graphical User Interface text has been updated to add missing text
– Updates the UK SMG Thompson spelling and French Grenadier weapon name
– Updates the gunsights for the Pak36, 17-pdr, and M4A3.
– Mission points for Capture, Destroy AI, Infantry Resupplier, Destroy FMS, Repair Bridge, Damage Bridge, Damage Factory, and Damage FB are now configurable by the Game Managers
– Updates the capture timers for campaign 152
– Fixes the way balancing capture timers work
– Bunkers have been updated to only be capturable from within the radio room
– The Credits have been updated to reflect CRS team changes
– An ongoing task is to ensure World War II Online is available to as many players as possible in their native language, the Game UI etc, has multi-lingual capability. This is continuously being updated as the game evolves.
============================================
Notes:
============================================
– The missing HUD images for both Italian infantry are known and will be updated with the next release
S! Cornered Rat Software

All veteran accounts at WWII Online have been reactivated to show the latest developments that have been made here and to raise awareness about our 2018 Roadmap and funding initiatives. Report to an active squad and get into the fight! For any account support please submit a ticket at http://support.wwiionline.com and our guys will get you squared away. Read the article for details on upcoming events, important announcements and some of the latest developments we’ve made to improve WWII Online. CRS welcomes back all of our veteran players, we’re glad to have you, SALUTE!

UPCOMING EVENTS

Daily Rally Call (Both Sides)

Every day hop on by 7PM Server Time, this will be the “Squad” night equivalent for both sides

GAME PLAY & UPDATES

We encourage you to get in and communicate on the forums at http://forums.wwiionline.com, join an active squad and hop on voice communications for best game play experiences. We’ll be running some special offers for those of you wanting to return to a more full-time status, so keep an eye on our special offers page in your account management area.

]]>https://whips-bge.com/2018/03/01/welcome-back-soldier-activated/feed/0CRS’ Roadmap 2018https://whips-bge.com/2018/01/19/crs-roadmap-2018/
https://whips-bge.com/2018/01/19/crs-roadmap-2018/#respondFri, 19 Jan 2018 21:24:48 +0000http://whips-bge.com/?p=1051 The big day is here and it’s time to show you what’s happening for 2018 at WWII Online and Cornered Rat Software! From completing some last remaining items in our 2017 roadmap, to several new vehicles, enhancing the software to a 64-bit version, redoing our user interface and getting the hybrid supply system in order, and the beginning stages of creating a new development Wing at CRS to move our graphics and assets to into the future. Okay everyone, get the popcorn ready, HERE WE GO!

2017 ROADMAP DELIVERY OVERVIEW

One of the most important things for our new team at Cornered Rat Software is to continuously deliver on the promises that we make to you. Internally we have something we like to go by, “Under promise – Over deliver.” While sometimes we cannot always make the timelines we set (because we’re a mostly volunteer team at this stage) we do our very best and take seriously following through. So the first part of this Roadmap is of course dedicated to showing you the things we did complete, and then how we’ll be prioritizing the items that require completion from 2017.

2018 ROADMAP KEY ITEMS

With those 2017 items coming to a close pretty rapidly, we wanted to focus on a couple of very important priorities that have been in progress for a bit now.

HYBRID SUPPLY SYSTEM (1.36)

We engaged heavily with the community and even our people internally about our original plans for 1.36, and we’ve made some changes that we think are going to do better to meet the best of both worlds, that being town based supply and what we know today with TOE’s / Brigades. We know that there are some issues with High Command officers and players have to do to keep the current system running, for those of you stepping up to HC and holding the line (we salute you big time!). But it’s our duty to make some changes and do the very best we can so that we set you up for success. So here are some short notes about what 1.36 will be about (now) and why this will have a very big impact on game play. It should be noted that several of our goals as announced last year still remain, so while this may be a bit redundant (and obvious to some of you vets) we’re going to be sure to list them out again so everyone knows what we’re trying to do.

Primary Goals Include:

Stabilizing the Campaign map during ALL time zones.

Providing more supply for the players throughout the entire theatre of operations.

Redeploying High Command’s focus on cultivating great community relations and massive coordinated battles.

HAVE MORE QUESTIONS? We’ve gone into great detail by answering player related questions in the following forum thread: VITAL 1.36 QUESTIONS (Q&A)

64-BIT GAME APPLICATION

Moving the game to 64-bit has tremendous advantages for us to expand our technologies, but even now it’s becoming ever more important. Effective September of 2018 Apple will be removing support for 32-bit applications (us) and we’re expecting Microsoft to be not too far behind that. So this is definitely getting up onto the hot plate of things for us to take care of. We’ve already been looking at the dependencies involved here and planning accordingly.

One thing that we do need to look into is our “Granny” software which is everything to do with our infantry game. This will be something we talk more about in the not so distant future with you more.

INTEGRATED VOICE COMMUNICATIONS

We have determined what plugin we want to use and the basic design of how integrated voice comms will look inside of the game. It is understood that integrated voice communication will enhance game play for new users AND veterans. We think it’s going to tie the entire in-game operation together much more efficiently and provide the most immersive World War II Online experience to date.

Users will be able to communicate directly in-game.

No additional download or client is planned.

Our goal is to have 3D positional audio for local communications.

A radio transmit function will exist (over the net).

Channels being considered include…

Local Chat: Proximity based, how close you are to friendly or foe forces.

Mission Chat: Be able to communicate to all participants on your mission.

Mission Leader Chat: If you are a mission leader assigned to a Target, this channel would act as an organization / command channel.

Squad Chat: Chat with your squad members globally throughout the Campaign.

High Command Chat: Talk with fellow HC officers in-game.

Disclaimer: This is according to our initial designs and is subject to change.

NEW VEHICLES & PRODUCTION GOALS

Our team has really come together working with the Creator software and overall they’ve learned a lot with having HATCH onboard. Let’s take a look at some of the new vehicles that are being considered:

Plane Variants

Me 109 E-4 Jabo (as pictured from the war on the right)

Me 109 G-2/R-1 Jabo

US P39D-1

French Hurri IIb

FW 190 A3

US P40F

US P39N-5

Tank Variants

Close Support

Matilda MkII CS

Crusader MkII CS

Churchill MkIII CS

Crusader MkIII CS

Churchill MkVII CS

Mk VI 15mm Besa

Stug H 105

Firefly (as pictured from the war below)

Achilles

Pz III L

Delivering you new vehicles to play with is a core goal for us this year and we feel pretty good with the team we have to pull together and make this happen.

Here is a historical photo of the Sherman Firefly (second from the left) during Operation Market Garden. Coming to WWII Online 2018!

Other Production goals and investigations include:

Smoke rounds for tanks.

White phosphorous for tanks.

Continuous flight model reviews and fixes.

Armor reviews and fixes.

LET’S TALK ABOUT TERRAIN

We’ve been spending quite a bit of time trying to unlock the ability to introduce terrain fixes and even expand the map. Thanks to one of our great volunteers Merlin51, we’ve learned so much about terrain building that we’ve invested some development time (pray for FRISBONE, he’s been working on this one hard) to figure out how we can take Merlin’s fixes within the TE (terrain editor) and place those into the game. We’ve still got a lot of work here but it’s getting closer and we can feel it.

Here’s what we’ll be focusing on once this is solved:

We’ve been taking your .reports and compiling known terrain issues around the map.

Merlin has a backlog of things already fixed (if not most of them) waiting for deployment.

We’ll continue to evaluate and improve any new reports or fixes to the fixes (it happens sometimes).

We’ll then proceed to changing or adding the layouts of existing towns.

And finally the end goal is to add more towns to the map and expand the theatre.

Now one of the cool experiments that I’ve asked Merlin to personally look into is see if we can take big towns (like Antwerp for example) and carve that into different sub-cities, so for example it’d be 3 towns instead of 1 big one. Let your mind go wild with that for a moment, he’s looking into it and it might be doable which would make things awfully interesting.

All in all, terrain is one of the hardest (and oldest) things to work on in WWII Online. The code base in this regard is not pleasant, so we’re going to need some grace here but we want you to know – we’re on it, doing all that we can.

SECOND WING OF CRS BEING BUILT

It is my duty as President of Cornered Rat Software to consistently evaluate how we can move the “ball” forward (so to speak) as it relates to the health and betterment of World War II Online, our great community, and the organization that is CRS supporting this effort. So today I will be formally announcing that I am in the process of creating a second wing (Wing 2) at CRS which will be focused on creating newer assets and getting folks involved and engaged with the Unreal Engine 4, for an eventual plan for a WWIIOL 2.0, which is still quite some time away (no estimate available, pending development speed). At some point in the future these two Wing’s will intersect. Both have the common goal of ensuring the longevity of WWII Online.

Wing 1 (our current team) will continue to be the backbone of the organization and will be 100% focused on the betterment and health of WWII Online as we know it. It is a key requirement of mine to ensure active development, both in terms of adding new features and fixes to the game. Under my leadership you can be assured that WWII Online will get the very best attention that it deserves.

That being said, we must proceed into the future. During the development of this 2018 Roadmap it will require an all-hands effort from Wing 1 of CRS. It is important to me to make sure we capitalize on this time the very best we can, and I have initiated a plan that will do so without taking the foot off of the proverbial accelerator as it relates to WWIIOL 1.0’s current development. This means that we need to bring on some new resources to specifically work on new things in order to not take away from the ambitious roadmap that we’re working towards for the current WWII Online development. We’re really excited to be able to grow our team and look to the future, so this should be viewed as a win-win solution.

WING 2 FUTURE DEVELOPMENT – WORK(S) IN PROGRESS

The process has started to get in Unreal Engine 4 to become familiar with its capabilities and workflows. These images represent basic demonstrations that deal with manipulating lighting and shadow effects, advanced modern texturing techniques, substantially higher poly meshes and asset placement within a scene. You’ll notice our continued pursuit to realism in our characters, equipment and weaponry.

Please remember that the following is a work in progress and does not represent the final outcome and delivery of the future. This is designed to show you the potential of how we can dramatically improve WWII Online’s assets and advance ourselves into the future as mentioned above.

Pictured below is our first test scene. We tried to capture a British defensive position, expecting contact from the front (right). You can see a heavy influence of high resolution textures and unique lighting engine properties that bring out tremendous colors, shaders and other great effects. This is 100% the game engine.

Here is the soldiers point of view from test scene 1, guarding their position and scanning for enemy movement.

Pictured below is our second test scene. This was to test modifying lighting and placing a variety of different assets in the scene. We were aiming to create a defensive position around a significant building, likely a field HQ for officers and local planning. Once again the textures and definition are pretty incredible. You can see there’s not much action for these soldiers as they’re in a fairly relaxed position, manning their post.

YOUR SUPPORT, VIA SUBSCRIPTIONS IS VITAL

It cannot be understated enough, that this year requires the ultimate backing of the WWII Online fanbase in order for us to sustain all of the hard work that has gone into rebuilding this new CRS team. Your subscription is very literally the lifeblood that continues this operation and it is the single sign of support (beyond moral) that has actionable effects, allowing me to do my job better and keep the great folks we have. Being that this is a volunteer thing for most, our trajectory and ability to get things done in a more timely manner is single handedly slowed down as a result of not being able to compensate these fine people working with us at CRS in a way that enables them to provide for themselves and for the game.

Make no mistake, we are truly grateful for all of the support that is out there right now. However it cannot be understated enough that with the proper backing of the fanbase in its entirety would do extraordinary things for World War II Online. This can be achieved by upgrading your subscription to a Premium or even a Hero Builder tier. I hope my words are being read clearly and you’ll do you part to join this incredible mission of bringing WWII Online to its future that we’ve been plotting for sometime.

We know we have lots of work to do and there’s never going to be a moment of perfection. But you can count on our team at Cornered Rat Software to continue what it has demonstrated over the last year, and that is: DELIVER. So consider backing us up for an extended period of time and giving us the proper tools to do the job even better. Upgrade your subscription now by going to http://www.wwiionline.com/account, and if you need any help the support guys are waiting for you at http://support.wwiionline.com.

If you’ve made it this far, I want to thank you for all that you’ve done over the years. It has been a tremendous blessing for this team of die hard WWII Online fans, we do not take it for granted for even a moment. Let’s have an awesome year and remember that we’re in this together, Allied or Axis, CRS or Player, we are all part of the WWII Online family and we all have to do our part to push this wonderful dream forward.

]]>https://whips-bge.com/2018/01/19/crs-roadmap-2018/feed/0Change of Commandhttps://whips-bge.com/2017/11/11/change-of-command/
https://whips-bge.com/2017/11/11/change-of-command/#respondSat, 11 Nov 2017 20:02:02 +0000http://whips-bge.com/?p=1044Those who joined today’s squad night already know, for those who couldn’t: I’ll be stepping down in my role as the acting Commanding Officer of WHIPS.
Almost to the day, it has been 2 years since WHIPS opened up for recruiting

Starting recruiting back then was my last attempt to stay with the game and not to unsub.
I liked the idea from the beginning and I was so hyped that I reserved a domain and started to install and run the forums the very same night.

I spent another few days getting to know phpbb, designing the forums, designing roles and permissions until I went public on psforums to let everyone know what my intention was and of course to get the first recruits on board.

I was looking for vets who felt the same way, who were on the verge of unsubbing.
First user to join the new boards was NY75. I was texting with him via WhatsApp prior the squad opening, so I knew I had his support and I knew he was about to unsub as well.

Eesti followed the day after…I was not sure if he would…but I knew if he would it would be epic!

With Eesti not only a few more Iron Wolves came through the door, like NJ, Majes, DrLoo, Hastien, Guikx, Shini but Mwittman from KGW and Voro and Syd from 250H as well.
In fact, one of Voro’s 2nd accounts, Priscilla, was the very first additional WHIPS member, next to Dilys and myself. She used that account whenever she needed time to cool down from HC or 250 :p
So she really is our unofficial first member :p

Then there was Dilys. I think we were active for roughly a month, or a little less, when she logged on the first time again. I did not discuss anything with her prior opening up WHIPS for recruiting.
So my heart kinda stopped beating when I saw her logging on and I thought “uh oh, I’m in trouble now”. Needless to say that she was fine and very supportive.

I only want to name one more thing from the early stage of our “new” squad and those who were around back then, most likely still remember. Axeinc. A very special character.
Whenever someone asked me what the requirements were in order to join the squad, I only replied “No drama!”.
But Axeinc brought so much drama that I think eventually Majes invented our slogan “No whining, just killing!” Axeinc was the first squad member to be manually removed.

This all was 2 years ago. In those two years we had tons of moments of joy but moments of grief as well.
Whats the greatest thing for a squad CO you might ask? The greatest thing of all would be to have given the pleasure to in some way meet all of you and get to know your story.
Even though I never have met anyone of you in real life I still feel very close to a lot of you. Feels like we have known each other for an eternity.
That’s why as well it even was greater to see squaddies to step in for each other. Be it for Hastien when Hvyoutput passed away, NY when his wife passed away or DrLoo when he had his tragic accident.
This means a lot as it means it is more than just a bunch of guys playing a computer game.

Having to do deal with death is always not easy. Dealing with Hvyoutput’s death as the squad CO was the most challenging part in my “gaming career”.
Not only was I griefing as everyone else in one way or another but I as well set myself under a lot of pressure for the ceremony.
I probably will never forget that Chyrenz screwed me over in organizing the flyby for Hvyoutput but then again the situation showed how beautiful this community is. We had a lot volunteers, axis and allied, on the scene within minutes doing the flyby.

It took a while to accept that he is gone. It definitely was the toughtest time for me as your CO.

While the last two years included a lot of fun I unfortunately have lost the energy to continue as active CO.
Every squad needs active leadership or it will fall apart sooner or later. I’ve witnessed it by just watching so many squads going down during my 13 years of WW2OL.
I want to see the squad to succeed and I don’t want to stay in the way.

Thankfully Majes99 accepted his new role as acting Commanding Officer of WHIPS. He has proved himself many times to the squad as a valuable leader. So I have no doubts that he will do great!
But with that I as well want to hand out a warning to everyone. The squad cannot be managed by a single person. Everyone, from CO to XO, to recruiter, member and recruit, everyone has to invest to make this happen!
You cannot rely on a single person to deal with everything.
In the past two years we always had the same handful of people being active on the forums, trying to move the squad forward. Unfortunately those few are the minority of people we usually should field with a roster of 100 or more squad members.
And those few active will burn out at some point as well.

It would help tremendously if everyone would be more active and ask if help is anywhere needed.
I just want to remind everyone that we never managed to field a single additional recruiter because no one cared besides the few who already fielded other roles and positions.

Every single one of you is responsible to keep the squad what it is! Majes will not only need active XOs but active members as well. Help him out, be active on the forums!

Having said that, I wish Majes and the squad all the best for the future! I know the squad is in good hands.
I will assume the role of Co-Founder and will consult the senior command. I will remain with the squad.

See you on the battlefield!

bb

]]>https://whips-bge.com/2017/11/11/change-of-command/feed/0Friday update 22.09.2017: Updating legacy artwork and weapon performance datahttps://whips-bge.com/2017/09/23/friday-update-23-09-2017-updating-legacy-artwork-and-weapon-performance-data/
https://whips-bge.com/2017/09/23/friday-update-23-09-2017-updating-legacy-artwork-and-weapon-performance-data/#respondSat, 23 Sep 2017 10:11:03 +0000http://whips-bge.com/?p=1036Well we’re now 100% released on Steam and the team has done a pretty solid job at improving stability of the Campaign server. We’re keeping a watchful eye on the feedback coming from new Steam users and how we can improve their onboarding experience to WWII Online. Today we’re going to cover a bit of Production and things happening in the pipeline now that we’ve crested this major milestone of getting the game onto Steam. This includes us improving some legacy art, and today we’ll unveil the new iconic 88mm model that is inbound to the game shortly.

NEW 88MM MODEL INBOUND

One of the oldest models we have in game at this stage is a real eye sore. A major thanks to SADGUY for focusing his energy on getting this iconic weapon to look tremendously better and brought into the modern era.

VEHICLE CREW MEMBER UPDATES

As you can witness with the 88mm crew members from the BEFORE & AFTER fixes the crew members are being updated. We are currently experimenting with bringing those crewmen up a notch even further using the latest character models we have. An investigation and test phase is underway to see how we can achieve that while maintaining performance for clients. It may seem like not a big deal but remember all of the things you’re currently rendering, those large scale challenges are still relevant.

Meanwhile some really old crew members are being updated and are in the can for deployment, which include:

251 Armored Carrier (Driver & Gunner)

Opel Driver

Morris Driver

Laffly Driver

Bedford Driver

Whacky Laffly Crew

Bofors Crew

We’ve been cleaning up several old crew members and we’re going to continue to do so. This will include creating some new character art, particularly for pilots, naval crewman, tank commanders and everything in between.

HIGH EXPLOSIVE (HE) & KINETIC ENERGY (KE) AUDIT(S)

A quick mention and tip of the hat to Scotsman and HATCH for the insane amount of energy they’re putting into getting you guys the most realistic / historically accurate data for how weapons should be performing. Most of the data work is completed here and we’re pushing to get this going and out for QA testing as quickly as we can. This will dramatically impact how bombs explode, including the type of fragmentation they throw and the affects it has on opposing vehicles. Kenetic Energy are non-explosive projectiles covering all round types, ranging from the Armored Piercing (AP) rounds from your tanks all the way down to the small arms weapons like rifles and hand guns.

STEAM PROGRESS THUS FAR

We’ve had more than 45,000 folks sign up for accounts in only 17 days on Steam. That is a pretty amazing achievement! Population levels remain substantially higher than we have seen in years, routinely around the clock. We’re very happy to report this progress and these production items coming (more not listed here) are intended to help bolster that success even further.

Major thanks to all of the veterans investing the energy to support us, stand up to those who are quickly criticizing our awesome game and make sure the new users get the most welcoming and “arms wide open” experience I have personally witnessed. You are all doing FANTASTIC, keep it up and don’t stop offering the help to the new guys that you’re doing so well!

SUBSCRIBE AND HELP THE MISSION

The Steam users have asked us to make it more clear for folks what your subscription goes towards here at WWII Online, let me help give you an idea and why you should subscribe:

Developers: We’re an understaffed small indie group, ranging from Programmers to Community Managers, Support and Marketing staff, Artists and much more.

Infrastructure: We operate and maintain our own servers, pay for our own bandwidth and hardware.

Opportunity: With your subscription, we can acquire more developers, get more of their time and product more results (code, fixes, features and new content).

Access more content: For helping us with all of those things, we’ll reward you with everything we have.

Become apart of our success: When you subscribe, you’re directly contributing to the continuation, upkeep and improvement of everything we do here.

As not all of us participated in the event and a lot of us were split up in different groups, I’d be interested in a few AARs to get different point of views of the whole OP.

I was member of Kampfgruppe Raider (Panzer GRP2) with DM79 as CO and no XO. With me from WHIPS was Mosizlak, Mwittman and NY75.

Both were not on Discord though, which gave Dm79 a bit of trouble as he could not relay quick and direct orders without having to type. So I sometimes jumped in and relayed his orders via text. In general, DM did a very good job leading the Panzer Gruppe 2. It was important to him that we arrive save at the target and slowly can build up pressure.

Unfortunately in a lot of cases the Infantry Kampfgruppen were a lot faster than our Armor but more about that later.

Namur

First target for the night and the Operation FALL GELB and our Panzer Gruppe 2 was Namur! Everything seemed to be uncoordinated though. So I jumped to the HC discord channel letting Germany know that he’s not talking to all of his leaders. With so many players on Discord it was a nightmare to find the leadership elements for that operation. I pulled a few up the channel but at least as long as I was there, Germany did not interact with them directly.

So I think most elements were clueless in the beginning. At least DM did not receive any orders but to go to Namur. He did not know who’s there and who’s doing what.

So his idea was to flank around and come in from the west, being able to support both ABs. SAB was already under cap once we crossed the last bridge, trying to get into position west of town.

We slowly moved towards NAB while NY75 and Ian77 dealed with some enemy tanks coming from Gembloux all the way down to Namur!

It was just a matter of time when NAB would have been fully overwhelmed by Axis forces. I myself ended up with only 2 inf kills. Not sure how those 2 EI made it past the hundreds of Axis infantry :p

Antwerp FBs

Once Namur was safe and sound we were ordered to support Shager’s Infantry Kampfgruppe in order to take down Antwerp FBs. I though did not know that we were attached to an Infantry Gruppe as I missed the first minutes. Anyway, DM asked me to get a 232 for recon. I heard a Beddy north of Boom which I was following but never found him.

I then went for the bridge east of Temse / Antwerp FB, which was our first target. Soon enough I was engaged by an ATG or ET. But our tanks just rolled in as well.

As the bridge itself was down and we had no Engineers with us I thought I’m going to bring an Opel and Engineer in order to repair the bridge. But I had to find out that all Engineers were gone. Found one Bluetag in the Boom AB as Engineer and picked him up. We went back to the bridge were our Panzers had the FB already locked down. When I arrived at the bridge I as well met Shager’s Infantry Kampfgruppe. Well, he had to deal with a lot of low ranks. They repaired the bridge and we rushed to Temse / Antwerp FB which was undefended by then.

Do to inexperience and low ranks of the players it did take quite some time to blow the FB. One of the few Engineers blew himself up at the VEH spawn.

Once done we moved out to the next Antwerp FB, St. Niklaas FB.

I was still in my Opel and I thought I would go ahead to see if it is defended. There was nothing but a Beddy. I was suprised that he did not see me.

Panzer Gruppe 2 moved in quickly, followed by Shager’s Opel and troops.

Suddenly EI spawns and finds my truck. I killed him, soon enough 2nd and 3rd ei popped up. I ended up with 5 or 6 kills but died before the force arrived. So I went buzzard to view the rest:

After that I was driving Suppo to the St. Niklaas FB in order to finish it. Other than that, no highlights. GJ mate!

Oh wait, NY75 flipped his 232.

Vireaux

Once the FB was Axis as well, we moved out for Vireaux. I can make that one short

We left Givet as a column but just did not make it in time to target. Town was capped before we even reached Vireaux. I think we still were 1.5 km out.

Mariemburg

That AO was kinda short, too. We moved out as soon as DM got the info for the new target. The AO itself was initiated by Paras, I think.

We had a short engagement NE and SE of town but by the time we got closer to town it was Axis already. Mwittman and I took care of a lost S76 but that was about it. Too slow, too late again. Mariemburg was flooded with Axis infantry. It was incredible to see on the map.

Gembloux

Again we had a good column going and a plan. DM wanted to strike from east of town.

He already noticed that we had to move quicker in order to be in time so we were less careful but still watched our flanks.

We got into town when it was already down to AB. So DM split us up, one group for N gate and one group for S gate. We not only covered the gates but we as well covered the murderholes along the AB walls.

Not a lot was getting out though. The infantry did a really good job. So the Tigers moved in to seal the deal. Shortly after Gembloux AB was Axis, followed by Wavre CP seconds later. Again a job nicely done!

Wavre

Here I was late again for the start as I was going afk for a few minutes. I as well disobeyed orders and stayed on the road to kill anything the main Panzer force would not kill from south hill.

They though quickly experienced enemy tanks from the south as the Wavre / Gembloux FB was still Allied.

I had 2-3 sorties I think with a few kills but called it a night shortly after. I was just getting tired. I do think it was the first town we did not cap that evening.

Resumee

First of all, DM79 did a hell of a job. He was a great leader. For those who were not on Discord, you should consider it next time, at least to listen in.

He felt very sorry for us for the lack of targets. It is clear that he would not lead his group blind into an ambush therefore I fully understand and fully respect his decisions. It was the right thing to do. So I will not blame him for having so few engagements.

We have seen a lot of action today! And I enjoyed sitting in my little bubble and not having to care about anything else! I’m not sure how the communication was upwards DM but at least he always had a target. Maybe Shagher or Majes99 can let us know about the communication as both had a CO and XO spot.

What I found fascinating was that we were underpopped most of the time but Axis did the caps!

I’ve talked to a few Allies and they found lack of communications and wrong choice of AOs. They decided to hit Antwerp hard just to find no Axis there. Axis were capping in Namur and Brussels. Brussels btw looked like it would be changing ownership, too. It was down to 1 AB and 2 CPs I remember once I checked the map. We did not get it though.

Anyway, I liked the event today!

It shows what potential WW2 Online has! We should see those kind of operations more often, hopefully organized by the CinCs!

]]>https://whips-bge.com/2017/09/18/operation-fall-gelb-case-yellow-aar/feed/0Friday update 01.09.2017 – F2P changeshttps://whips-bge.com/2017/09/01/friday-update-01-09-2017-f2p-changes/
https://whips-bge.com/2017/09/01/friday-update-01-09-2017-f2p-changes/#respondFri, 01 Sep 2017 18:31:42 +0000http://whips-bge.com/?p=1015 Steam is launching shortly and everyone is excited! Today we have opened the doors to our “Welcome Back Soldiers,” and we’re also doing some last minute fixes on our game server in preparation for that big launch. Meanwhile we are here to announce some important Free Play subscription improvements that we think will improve the experience for new players joining our game beyond their initial trial period. I also have an update regarding our server infrastructure (cell hosts)… So buckle up, here we go!

RANK THRESHOLDS INCREASED (NOW LIVE)

For a long time Free Play and Starter subscription users have been quickly hitting a wall in terms of progression. After some careful review the team at CRS has found a way to fix this, and allow Free Play and Starter subscribers to go from Rank 1 (Recruit) to Rank 13 (Lt. Colonel), while continuing to maintain the value and access behind each subscription type.

This is a major development because progression for users is very critical. People want things to work towards and it will also incentivize these users to go to a Premium account at a later time once they earn more rank, likely increasing the probability to bigger levels than previous.

FREE PLAYERS CAN POST MISSIONS (LIVE)

Missions are the gateway to accessing everything inside of the game, and since we want maximum flexibility for our users to rally up with their friends, this is another major development. It also means that these users won’t get bottlenecked or cut off from the game at anytime.

RESERVE SMG IS GOING TO STAY WITH FREE PLAY

After very careful consideration we want our Free Play subscribers to be able to access the limited submachine gun. There was talk about them having a Rifle only, and while we agree that this is the most important soldier on the battlefield, we also wanted to actively work to give them a taste towards an automatic weapon. For our non-free play subscribers, consider retention of the users. We want people to keep coming back and playing the game, because a populated battlefield is the most important aspect of our massively multiplayer online game. That said, we may tweak the load out a little more and reserve the right to do so.

30 DAY TRIAL FOR STEAM USERS – DURING SEPTEMBER

Because of our staggered roll out we are going to up the ante and create a maximum opportunity for our Steam users to get engaged and invested into WWII Online. Consider this an investment into these players. You will be able to keep all the rank you can earn and we’ve literally doubled the amount of free time you can get for everyone who signs up in September.

Possible option (decision to be made later): If this goes amazingly well, we may make the 30 day trial a default for Steam users. We’re actually going to be testing quite a bit to see how this goes and we’re happy with the decision for all of September. We want players in-game and having a good time to start a fantastic Steam launch, what better a way to welcome thousands of new community members?

So in a nut shell, these changes are all tailored to ensuring the best possible release and retention of users. We still feel confident that our other subscriptions maintain substantial value and hope users will learn to love our game and back up our small studio so we can expand our development capabilities, and more rapidly deploy new content and fixes.

CELL HOST(S) UPDATE

Reminder: Cell Hosts manage the total amount of concurrent users we can have via load balancing.

So we’ve had to do quite a few server restarts this week, sorry about that. It is crunch time and we have to make quick changes to prepare for. The good news is our development team found a major memory leak issue between cell hosts and clamped it. So while your HITS might be showing up as 0, even if you have a Kill (1), don’t worry about it we’re still counting all of those.

There may be some more server restarts so brace yourself, and understand that this is super important to iron out a couple last issues. We really appreciate your patience on all of this.

STEAM RELEASE SCHEDULE

WWII Online will be released between September 5th – September 22nd 2017. This is to ensure best game experiences and ramp up our player numbers. These dates are subject to change based on outcomes of unlocking each region.

September 5th: Canada, Mexico and South America

September 8th: United States of America

September 12th: All of Europe

September 15th: All of Asia

September 19th: Oceania

September 22nd: The rest of the world

SPREAD THE WORD ABOUT STEAM LAUNCH!

On a final note, please make sure to mention on any relevant site or platform or network of friends that WWII Online is coming to Steam, and can be easily found if you navigate to www.wwiionline.com/steam. Your help in raising awareness will undoubtedly work towards improving the amount of traffic that shows up and will amplify our success.

The steam release for WW2OL is getting closer and without exaggerating, it is around the corner! CRS yesterday announced their steam release plan! The steam release is going to happen in several waves in order to somehow protect the health of the servers, if that is even possible

Here’s is an overview of the release dates:

Prior the release on steam, CRS is going to start their next Welcome Back Soldier (WBS) program. It is going to start on 01.09.2017 and is going to last until 01.12.2017. Within those 3 months every returning vet will receive 30 days of premium access, which can be activated.

Same, by the way, goes for any newly signed up player on Steam. They will receive 30 days of premium access before they drop to rifle only.

Last but not least we have a major upcoming eventon 17.09.2017! The event is called “FALL GELB / CASE YELLOW“. The event planning is still at an early stage and objectives probably will be only publically known 24/48 hours prior event start, because it is going to be initiated on the live server.

We as WHIPShave an unique oppurtinity to show up in force and as a unit! We can fill a whole Kampfgruppe with 30 slots and therefore can work together on the objective.

In order to register WHIPSwith 30 slots for the event I will be in need of YOUto let us know that you are going to participate in this event. Please post your feedback and as well seek more information here: http://whips-bge.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1092

This shall be it for today! Everyone should be very excited! Prepare mentally for a new WW2OL experience in just a few day! Make sure you help out as many greentags as you can!

Thanks!

bierbaer

]]>https://whips-bge.com/2017/08/26/steam-release-wbs-and-special-events/feed/0A little comeback 14.08.2017https://whips-bge.com/2017/08/15/a-little-comeback-14-08-2017/
https://whips-bge.com/2017/08/15/a-little-comeback-14-08-2017/#respondTue, 15 Aug 2017 07:09:35 +0000http://whips-bge.com/?p=1001We had some nice battles going on yesterday but due to webmap still being down I unfortunately cannot say what the ultimate outcome was.

Remagen

When I logged on Axis were attacking Remagen from Unkel. Didn’t really believe in we would cap shit so I instantly logged on my 2nd account and thought gonna tow a pak40 up the hill NE of Unkel to maybe engage anything spawning in Remagen. We had couple bofors in the AB so I collected them all plus an additional pak40 and up we went the hill.
Hastien was already stationed on the hill, further east though. DrLoo was just on the way to provide him with some ammo with an Opel and therefore had to take the scenic route to get to him.
Once we made it up to the hill there was nothing to shoot at though but for the bofors who could occasionally engage an EA. Not sure if NY scored any kills up there.

Majes logged on and joined 250H for a bunker rush. Soon enough they overwhelmed the Allied forces and flag has been kicked. Town changed ownership shortly after.

Koblenz

Toxic asked where we would want to go next and I saw an option to get Frankfurt (factory town) back. We would have to stop by in Koblenz though.
I only saw air flags in Koblenz even watching twice closely but I obviously missed the one army flag.
Well eventually it was even better as it made us having to fight for Koblenz.
We rolled out with I think 5 Opels, thankfully undisturbed. Everyone managed to set a FMS. Allies responded shortly after at the N CP. Cochem CP was the key as we did not want Allies to move in another flag.

Majes and I had it capped round about 70% I think when we died. From then on it was quite a heavy fight for the N CP. I had quite some bluetags on my FMS so we went for the Remagen CP and even managed to cap it. Did not even realize it was a spawn lol.
After some time Allies seemed to have stopped spawning at the NCP area as we all of the sudden managed to cap Cochem CP rather easily.

AF bunker and therefore Allied Air flags have been capped and bounced shortly after.
Shini had a potentially great FMS for the AB but unfortunately one AI tower and single EIs made it kinda tough to approach. I managed to get into bunker but got killed inside by probably the only defender.
In the meantime DB7s were on our FMS’. We lost one by one.
It was important to keep bringing in those FMS’ or the AO would have died down.

I brought one roughly 850m west of the AB. 250H and I managed to get inside the bunker but I got blasted by an ATG shortly after entering. Only 2x 250h remained and they could not hold the bunker to cap it.

I then decided to bring a tank as it seemed that was all we needed to seal the deal. Allies were getting low and we had another full division at our disposal.
When I arrived I went straight into the AB, nothing serious was spawning anymore. Axis immediately crowded the bunker and town changed ownership! What a nice victory that was!

Frankfurt

Next target obviously was Frankfurt. Thanks to Hastien we immediately were working on Frankfurt FB.
In the meantime Allies vacated Mendig which was a tremendous help as we always would risk a cut off with going from Remagen to Koblenz and then to Frankfurt.
Shortly after Allies vacated Frankfurt as well, which was quite surprising.
This unfortunately was as well the moment when Ohm announced that he will bring the servers down to bring US forces into the game. With a short notice of 15 minutes it kinda ended the successful evening for us.

DrLoo and I managed to cap Bad Sobernheim CP in Frankfurt 15 seconds before the server went down. Not sure if it had any impact later on.

Too bad the night had to end that way but it still was a great fight, especially at Koblenz.
GJ WHIPS!

Center town in Monchen, between rubbles and fuel depots my STUG III G {AKA The Lion of Monchen } saw 3 Churchill tanks entering its den…
Positioned approximately 250 meters to their East and flanking them I unleashed the FURY with a volley of AP claws…
Within 10 seconds all 3 ETs where blowing up.
As I was sweeping the dust off my Lion’s skin and petting him for a being such a good boy a 4th Churchill entered the area and quickly received a death blow… Too close to my boneyard said the Lion!

As in good Allie fashion {smelling burned flesh} more ETs came to the same kill zone and immediately a Matilda caught on fire…
I could not hide my joy and advertised to my buddies the great Lion’s kill!
Suddenly a M10 and an A15 appeared from nowhere and stopped right there between Gandy’s balls still rolling and Mundagurry’s intestines wrapped around his burned tank tracks…

I first hit the A15 in the butt and instantly realized the damage down… Flames came out, a burst… Likely this Allie was still a Virgin among its peers.
Tiger004’s M10 facing me, I pondered for 1/10000 of a second and said… “No Sir, their shall be only ONE BIG CAT in this den”: SHAGHER!
And what happened next was a firework of blood, guts and metal going in every directions, also 2 very small marbles…. Tiger004 was KAPUT!

But as the old Lion ate too much too fast, after a last burp of Stella Artois well deserved… Passed away…. {Goreblimey}.